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trench ww1 descriptive essay
trench ww1 descriptive essay
trench ww1 descriptive essay
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Trench Life According to Soldiers Rather than Official Accounts Trench warfare was a viscous and violent way to fight a war. In World War 1 there were over 600 kilometres of trenches that separated East and West Europe between Belgium and France. They were started by the Germans who dug them for protection after their defeat at Marne by Britain and France. Both sides kept on digging and digging their trenches to stop the other side form outflanking them. The trenches grew and the western front was formed. This place is where the most horrific battles occurred in the First World War. The trenches became soldier's homes as well as their protection. This essay is going to look at many sources form many different places and will try to answer the question "Did the Soldiers Themselves, Give a more Accurate Picture of Trench Life than Official Accounts?" It is my hope that by the end of the essay I will be able to come to an accurate answer to this question by using sources I have studied. In section A the sources are mainly from history textbooks of the 20th Century. I will first look at these sources because they should be accurate and reliable, they should be able to provide reliable information for me to base the other sources on. I will compare and contrast the sources form section A to other sources to help me get a more balanced, accurate view. Section B includes the official accounts of the war. These include photos, painting and adverts. From these sources I should be able to get an accurate view of what the war was portrayed to be like by officials. When looking at these sources I must be careful that they are not biased or inaccurate. I will also be able to compare these sources to other sources I have already looked at. In section C the sources are the soldiers accounts of life in the trenches. I think many of these sources will be exaggerated so I must acknowledge that when I study these sources.
World War I, also known as the Great War, lasted from the summer of 1914 until the late fall of 1918. The war was fought between the Allies, which consisted mainly of the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire, and the Central Powers, which consisted mainly of the German Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the Kingdom of Bulgaria (Alliances - Entente and Central Powers). In total, it is estimated that twelve million civilians and nine million combatants died during this horrific and devastating war (DeGroot 1). When the war first began in 1914, many people thought that it would be a war of movement that would quickly be over. However, that changed when the Germans, who were trying to reach and capture the city of Paris in France, were forced to retreat during the Battle of the Marne in September 1914 (Ellis 10). German General von Falkenhayn, who felt that his troops must at all cost hold onto the parts of France and Belgium that they had overtaken, ordered his men to dig in and form defensive trench lines (Ellis 10). The Allies could not break through the enemies lines and were forced to create trenches of their own (Ellis 10). This was only the beginning of trench warfare. A war of movement had quickly come to a standstill on the Western Front. A massive trench line, 475 miles long, quickly spread and extended from the North Sea to the Swiss Frontier (Ellis 10). With neither side budging, soldiers were forced to live in the most miserable of conditions. Simply put, life in the trenches was a living hell. A lieutenant of the 2nd Scottish rifles wrote, “No one who was not there can fully appreciate the excruciating agonies and misery through which the men had to go [through] in those da...
was useful for firing over the top as you could rest your gun on it.
The First World War saw a new form of warfare known as Trench warfare which involved trenches which were deep long dugouts made by the soldiers that lived in these trenches. The trenches proved useful as they protected the soldiers from artillery and bomb fire and were most likely situated in the eastern and western fronts of Europe. However the conditions of the trenches were far from exuberant but were in fact severely terrible. There was bad hygiene throughout the trenches, for example soldiers bathed probably only once a month and as such were prone to diseases such as trenches fever (which were due to the lice attracted by the bad hygiene). The weather was no exception as well, in the summer it would be too hot and in the winter it would be too cold and due to the nature of the trenches, when it rained the trenches would be filled with water, and due to such conditions welcomed the disease known as trench foot which was due to prolonged exposure to water and claimed the foots of many soldiers. There was also the constant danger of bomb fire and snipers would always be on the lookout for any movement. Latrines, which were toilets used in the trenches also sprouted fear as the enemy could see them in this area of the trenches and therefore were in constant danger of death. Soldiers also had to follow a strict code of conduct which was known as trench etiquette which ordered them to respect higher officers and they would have to be punished if the trench etiquette was ignored.
Trench Warfare World War 1 is perhaps best known for being a war fought in trenches, ditches dug out of the ground to give troops protection from enemy artillery and machine-gun fire. The trenches spread from the East to the West. By the end of 1914, trenches stretched all along the 475 mile front between the Swiss border and the Channel coast. The trench system on the Western Front consisted of front-line, support and reserve trenches. Three rows of trenches covered between 200 and 500 yards of ground.
Soldiers' Account of Trench Life Life in the trenches was horrific; the frontline soldiers dreaded having to return to them. During their tour of duty there, they lived in considerable tension. The trenches were far from safe; possibly one third of all casualties on the Weston front were killed or wounded in the trenches, mostly from artillery fire. In this essay I will be discussing and comparing the accuracy and differences between the soldiers' accounts of the trenches and official accounts composed by the government.
It is evident that WW1 soldiers were deeply impacted by the war. Historians have found numerous journals and diaries that tells personal experiences from soldiers. Especially since this was a war that had a lot of new inventions, these soldiers had a lot to write about. Trench warfare changed the war entirely. Generals had to come up with better fighting tactics to make advances during the war. Prior to WW1 battles were fought out in the open and with less protection. There was no barb wire or sandbags to protect these soldiers. Life in the trenches were rough with constant firing occurring every few seconds. This made it very difficult for them to rest. In the trench soldiers are active all day and have to be ready for combat at all times. The daily journal of Pvt. Donald Fraser gives great detail of what actually took place on the battlefield.
The Great War, fueled by the excessive pride of each country, devastated the world. Each side felt superior to the other and would not stop until it emerged as the victor. These countries altered the style of fighting from a primitive face-to-face combat to systematic style of battle through trenches. To adapt to this style, countries developed new weapons and tactics to prevail over their enemies. But, the war simply remained a draw. Trench warfare prolonged World War I by a causing a bloody stalemate where millions died from modern weapons and horrid living conditions.
When one thinks of war they think of one side attacking the other, but in this war we spend much of our time in damp, muddy trenches, which smell of sewage and rotting corpses. The sun is high so we all lay low in the trenches to avoid sniper fire. So I sit and rest enjoying the break, using the time to clean my bolt-action rifle. My fellow brothers-in-arms are busy taking care of everyday tasks such as personal hygiene or writing letters home.
In the beginning of World War One the common outlook on warfare was that of a primarily mobile and open method of attack. Trench warfare was thought to be a temporary phenomenon which would be replaced by infantry and cavalry skirmishes. No one had predicted that only after a couple of months of open and mobile warfare, the November of 1914 would begin four years of static trench warfare.
The factors and themes of trench warfare during the twentieth century led to a mass communication failure. During the time of technical development of steel and communication, which had extended the Western Front stalemate of 1914-1918----. As the situation began to exacerbate, miscommunication based on trench warfare paved the way as a form of rite of passage which led to battlefield failures in all degrees. Although new methods of communication expanded exponential growth during the war years, the recognition of communication holistically failed to reach full potential. Especially on the Western Front as it only achieved interminable stalemate of causalities.
taken a shower so once again they had to put up with it. When it
During World War I, many countries used a war tactic called trench warfare. This is where two opposing troops set up camp in trenches facing each other and fight. The land in the middle of them is called “No Man’s Land”. This war tactic was first made in the seventeenth century by a man known as Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban. It was the man defense tool during this war.
beginning of the essay is that of a promise. He says of promise that one must have powerful
Trench Warfare was used in World War one and it was very dangerous and deadly. Trench warfare was used because during the First Battle of the Marne September 1914 the Germans were pushed back by the Allied army. When they became stalemate the Allies began digging protective trenches because they couldn’t break through the German defense line. These trenches turned into one of the main features of the war for the next four years.
Trench warfare was introduced in order to bring a barrier between forces. They were dug by soldiers and were very lengthy, but very cramped. Soldiers crouched down for extended periods of time to keep their heads blocked from being a target for the other side. They sat their watching their friends die from disease and from being shot, bombed, or poison gassed while they waited to fire their weapons at the enemy.